Melting Through My Heart
by The Vampire Alchemist
Summary: Welcome to Central Orphanage, miss..." "Armstrong. Olivier Armstrong. I'm here to speak with you about Edrys Elric." Parental!OlivierxFem!Ed. Intend to be romanceless, but who knows what will sneak in. T for language.


_Ack! Sorry! Sorry! Sorry! This idea popped into my head in the middle of church and it wouldn't leave me the hell alone! I'll try to update my other stories soon. The Titanic crossover will be updated soon, and Golden Eyes, like I said, is on a TEMPORORY HIATUS. The other ones, though, I can't make any promises. _

_Parental!OlivierxFem!Ed. Other than that, I plan for this to be completely romanceless. Who knows, though? Something might slip in. _

Melting Through My Heart

Olivier Mira Armstrong was named an Ice Queen for a reason. She'd locked her emotions away, and attacked with thought out strategy and logic. Her own mother could die and she wouldn't even shed a single tear or lose any sleep over it. She was hazardous to any and all bachelors, and the thought of starting her own family disgusted her. She didn't need any god-forsaken little brats calling her "mommy" at the top of their lungs. Ugh.

But fate has a way of messing with people's hearts. She honestly had never intended for this to happen. She was having 2 weeks of vacation time, which was odd enough, because she didn't usually take a vacation. She couldn't even remember the last time she had. However, her family had been bugging her to hell for the past few years, begging for a visit, and after all, Drachma seemed to be behaving themselves. She left Captain Buccaneer in charge and left for Central.

And when she arrived back home at the Armstrong Estate, she had a damn fine entrance. She had given Catherine a brief hug, tolerated her parents' greeting, and had beaten Alex to a pulp, telling him that she'd run him through if he ever tried to greet her in his overly dramatically way again. Overall, it had been a good day. By now, though, her patience with her family was wearing thin, and she thanked any higher power out there that this family visit was almost over.

She was walking down the streets of Central, utterly bored. The shining excitement of beating up her younger brother has lost its luster, and all Catherine ever wanted was to go shopping, god forbid. Olivier was half-wishing that Lt. Colonel Mustang would appear out of thin air, just so she could bash him. His ego needed a good beating every now and then. Any young men that approached her was greeted with the evil eye. It was a small pleasure, but still not enough to bring an end to her boredom.

The sound of children's voices brought her out of her musings. She looked to her left, and saw that her legs had unconsciously brought her to the Central Orphanage. She scowled; how stupid. But still, as she turned away, the voices got louder and she could hear that they were taunting someone. One of the voices was getting more and more agitated. Curiosity got the best of her and she walked up to the yard fence.

There was a group of children, all appeared to be about 10 years old, except for one girl, who must've been about 8. At first, one would've thought her to be a plain, ordinary girl, but her appearance alone would disprove that statement.

Her hair was a sort of gold-ish strawberry blond. There wasn't nearly as much red in her hair, as say, Catherine's, but at the same time, it was darker than Olivier's almost platinum blond. What red was in the girl's hair, as small as it was in its quantity, made it look as if it had been spun from pure gold. It vaguely brought up a ridiculous fairy tale Olivier's mother used to stuff down her throat; something about a girl and a dwarf named Ruffle-whatever. (1)

The little girl's eyes were equally stunning, looking like pools of molten gold, and they carried an intelligence that most did not find in a child of her age. They had obviously seen some terrifying things; things that not even the most hardened soldier wouldn't wish on his greatest enemy. But the most perplexing thing about the girl was the two limbs of steel grafted onto her body.

The enigmatic girl was surrounded by the elder children, her golden eyes glaring angrily at each of them. The children were far enough away from Olivier that she couldn't hear exactly what they were saying, but it was quite clear that they were teasing the girl. They were laughing at her, calling out names like "Freak!" and "Metaloid!" One child even pushed her to the ground, calling out, "Bean girl!"

It was a curious and almost comical thing to witness what happened next. The girl seemed to radiate raw fury and power. Murder was quite intent in those golden orbs now, as she slowly rose from her place on the ground, lifting her tank-top strap back onto her shoulder. She clenched her fists…and attacked.

"_WHO THE HELL ARE YOU CALLING A RUNT SO TINY THAT SHE WOULDN'T EVEN GET CAUGHT IN A SPIDER'S WEB BECAUSE SHE WAS TOO SMALL TO EVEN GET STUCK IN THE STICKY STRANDS AND WOULD JUST PASS THROUGH IT?!" _

It was absolutely amazing that she had been able to say all that in one breath while she massacred all the poor victims, with might Olivier add, was extremely advanced and effective martial arts. She even almost pitied the children who were unfortunate enough to discover just how hard an automail fist was.

"EDRYS ELRIC!!" a voice screeched. A woman with short, choppy red hair came out into the yard, just about as murderous as the girl—Edrys, what a strange name, Olivier thought—had been a moment ago. The area around Edrys looked like a battlefield. All the children were definitely unconscious, and those hit by the automail were most likely going to have concussions.

"I'm very disappointed with you; you are in BIG trouble, young lady!"

"But Clara, they were bullying me again."

"Then you should've come to me. How many times have I told you to not pick fights?"

"24 times." Edrys muttered. That was all Olivier caught of the conversation before Clara and Edrys disappeared into the building. Other orphanage employees came out to take the other children inside. Olivier's boredom was very much gone by now. It was overall a very amusing experience she'd just had. But, she reminded herself that she had no time for children, so she started to head back home. Maybe one more round of Alex-bashing would do her good before she had to leave in 2 day's time. However, on the way back home, those honey-gold eyes haunted her.

'_Go ahead,' _a voice seemed to say, _'Take a chance.'_

'_No,' _her logic argued back, _'A child at Briggs would just be a nuisance. She'd just get in the way.'_

'_You never know until you try it,' _the voice argued back. _'That girl could certainly take care of herself, and she'd make a damn fine soldier.'_

'_Yeah, like the military would a little girl in their ranks. It's not allowed.' _

'_Rules are made to be broken. Besides, you could train her until she's old enough to join.' _

Olivier growled as once again, her curiosity won out and she turned back in the direction of the orphanage. When she once again standing infront of the building, she rapped smartly on the door and was greeted by Clara. The woman smiled gently and said,

"Welcome to the Central Orphanage, miss…"

"Armstrong. Olivier Armstrong. I'm here to talk about Edrys Elric."

--

"Name: Edrys Lucy Elric," Clara read aloud from Edrys' file.

"Age: 11 years old." That surprised Olivier; the girl was short for her age, a fact she didn't take kindly to, she recalled.

"Weight: about 103 pounds. Height:…we're not quite sure; she becomes too volatile when we try to measure her, but we guess that she's about 4' 10". She was born in the small village of Resembool. Her father left the family when she was at a young age, and we're not sure where he is, or if he's even alive. Her mother and brother were taken in a fire that claimed her entire hometown. The fire was started by a group of Ishbalans during the war."

Olivier nodded. She remembered vaguely hearing about the destruction of Resembool. "She seems to be very skilled at martial arts and melee."

Clara nodded. "She is; She and her younger brother were taught by a master shortly before the fire. And she's very smart, Miss Olivier; very smart."

"How smart?"

"We once had her IQ tested and her results came back at genius level. She's a real child prodigy."

"What about those metal limbs of hers?"

Clara seemed to wince. "Well, she's very adept at alchemy," An alchemist; even more impressive. "One night, she ran off to an abandoned warehouse to attempt some sort of transmutation that backfired on her. She lost her left leg and right arm. There's a friend of a friend who is an automail mechanic, and she was kind enough to make Edrys some limbs for much less than the usual price. Infact, I think Edrys has become good friends with that mechanic's grandson."

"Can I meet with her? Edrys, I mean."

Clara smiled and stood. "Her room is this way."

--

_(1) I was referring to Rumplestiltskin, in case you were wondering. /checks/ Nope, don't own FMA. TT__TT _


End file.
